"The least you could do is try it."
Greg made a face and stuffed a piece of fried fish in his mouth — Britain's best, in his opinion. "I'd rather choke on a fishbone," he answered around his food.
Iain rolled his eyes and picked up a piece of sushi — his personal favourite. He loved it. He loved all Asian food, actually — the more obscure, the better. But as far as Greg was concerned, it reeked, and it needed a lot more time in the pan before he'd have anything to do with it.
The old DI's stubbornness was unbelievable.
"So you're not even going to give it a chance?" Iain asked, leaning back into the sofa and taking a bite.
"It's made with weeds."
Iain fought back the urge to stick one of the chopsticks through his temple. "I'll stop badgering you if you take one bite."
"Are you my mum now? What is this?"
"You don't even know what it tastes like!"
Greg looked up from his own fish and chips and stared. Many a lesser man had buckled under the weight of that "Are you bloody joking?" gaze — but Iain, through personal experience and sheer willpower — was made of sterner stuff. He stared bluntly back.
Greg reached out, grabbed a piece of sushi between two fingers and held it up to his mouth. "If this kills me, I'll kill you." He shoved it into his mouth.
"I don't know where to beg—" But Greg was spitting the roll out before Iain could even finish. He couldn't have possibly chewed, or even bitten down, before his mouth was open and his tongue was shovelling the offending mess right back out into his lap.
Iain stared in disgusted horror.
Greg, in turn, looked like he'd eaten dirt. He scraped his tongue against his teeth repeatedly as he reached for his beer — and promptly drained the bottle. "That was foul."
Iain silently fumed. "Did it even touch your tongue?" He asked shortly.
"Thinking about getting a knife to cut it out, personally," Greg answered sourly. And then he was back to stuffing his face with salty chips and fried cod.
And suddenly finding himself without much of an appetite, Iain sat quietly and chewed on the inside of his lip.
Greg was the first to speak up — but not until several minutes later, after he'd all but demolished his meal. "It's made you sick, hasn't it?" He joked.
"We're never going to compromise on this, are we?"
"What's to compromise?" Greg asked, wiping his mouth. Oh, the irony. "You eat weird shit that might kill you. I eat real food."
Iain turned away and put his plate down on the coffee table. Greg didn't know it, but the younger detective was silently trying to convince himself that he was overreacting — that this was just typical Greg behaviour — and that there was no reason to be so incredibly annoyed with such a silly comment.
But the more he thought about it, the more unhappy it made him.
He loved foreign food. He didn't really care where it came from — Iain was willing to try anything at least once. When he and his detective sergeant travelled to New Mexico, he'd eaten a scorpion lollipop. It was bizarre, but it wasn't the worst thing he'd ever tasted. That honour went to a French dish involving some poor animal's brains.
But Greg — an ex-smoker with insanely nationalist taste buds — wouldn't give non-British food the time of day unless Iain begged. And even then…
Iain wrinkled his nose. "And I don't really care about football, but you're weirdly obsessed with it," he retorted disdainfully.
Greg snorted. "You're a liar. Everybody loves football."
"Everybody except me. Oh, and Sally… and Anderson. And Gregson, Dawes," he kept going, ticking off other detectives on his fingers.
The humour slowly slipped out of Greg's expression. "What's your point, Iain?"
"That maybe we're a little too different," Iain answered, standing up. Greg didn't follow — he kept his eyes focused on the place where Iain had been sitting as the other man walked away. "I'm going to the office."
"It's nearly eleven."
Behind him, Iain shook his keys. "International MIT." He did a lot of his work at home — or elsewhere in the world — but he could still get into the building when he needed to. He slipped into his shoes and pulled on his coat.
"Planning on coming back tonight?" Greg asked casually, reaching for the remote.
"Probably not," Iain answered, walking out the door.
They both knew from his tone that he was seriously considering never coming back at all.
